


Limelight

by IntuitivelyFortuitous



Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Theatre, Implied Sexual Content, Lots of Name Drops, M/M, McSpirk - Freeform, Music, No actual explicit content, Strong Language, Theatre
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-06
Updated: 2017-02-06
Packaged: 2018-09-22 08:49:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9597959
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IntuitivelyFortuitous/pseuds/IntuitivelyFortuitous
Summary: Leonard falls in love with the stage, Spock falls in love with Leonard, and Jim brings them all together.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RiddleBlack](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RiddleBlack/gifts).



> This is a belated STnetwork gift filled for Riddleblack <3

Act 1: Rehearsal: September

 

“Dad, it’s from like _nineteen thirty_ ,” she complained, probably more upset about going with her dad than the show itself. He hoped she wasn’t quite at that stage yet, but he knew it was probably inevitable.

“Okay, first of all, Jo? It’s from the sixties. And I know how much you loved the one that your mother took you to, so don’t give me that.” He tugged on his boots with a sigh.

“But why do I have to wear a _dress_?”

Leonard nearly rolled his eyes. Joanna looked beautiful in her little yellow dress. He’d been waiting for it to fit her for a year and a half so he could send her aunt the required pictures (as he was supposed to do with Christmas presents, even though he rarely did). He spent an hour helping her do her hair into the same impossibly shaped but very pretty curls that her mother occasionally sported.

“You’re wearing a dress because you can’t go to a professional musical in jeans and a t-shirt and because you wouldn’t let me buy you those slacks when we went to the mall. Hold on, you’ve got a stray hair.” He pinned back a curl of dark brown with a bobby pin. He usually kept a handful in his pocket when she was around.

Jo didn’t say anything else as they turned to leave, but he knew that was her excitement showing. She never had been very good at playing at reluctance when it got right down to it.

They pulled up to the theatre, freshly repainted but looking very, very retro, and showed their tickets. It was Guys and Dolls, hell, there were probably three high schools performing the exact same thing, but it was something to do, at least. He’d probably catch a few winks during the more…traditional bits. 

 

Leonard did not fall asleep. In fact, he barely _blinked_. He wasn’t exactly a connoisseur of the arts, not in the least, but he could tell when something was _good_. Joanna was leaning forward with her hands clenched on either side of velvety red chair and her mouth hanging open. He didn’t even take the time to elbow her and tease her not to catch flies. The curve of the floor dipped towards the stage in a way that was almost intimate. He couldn’t have looked away if he wanted to. The female lead—Sarah—was played by a woman whose voice made every hair on his body stand up and the part of Nathan been filled by a young man with a stupidly attractive smile and a gift for comedy. He wondered who the director was. He was starting to regret not taking a program at the door.

By the time they were swept away with the crowds heading out, he was still attempting to wrap his mind around the dances and transitions and colors. He shook his head and snagged a cast booklet for he and Jo.

“Oh my god, Dad,” she said, cheeks flushed and eyes wide.

“I know,” he replied, unlocking her car door.

“Oh my god.”

“Yep,” he said, feeling the same sense of awe.

“When can we go back?” her hands were clutched in the folds of her dress like she was ready to leap out and run back in. He didn’t blame her.

“We’ll check when we get home,” he promised and shifted into drive.

Unfortunately for them, they’d been two days too late. Guys and Dolls was the last of a traveling group’s performances in the state. The article said they’d be creating a permanent group at a nearby theatre, but not for a good while. He hid his disappointment by slapping a smile on and telling her that they’d go to La La Land when he had her again next weekend, but he knew that a movie just wasn’t the same. He couldn’t fall in love with the actors and the set the same way, and the music just wasn’t as close to home.

They saw La La Land. It was alright.

 

Three months later, he was driving without much purpose after his shift, not wanting to go home to a house that he hadn’t had time to clean in a week. It was September and the leaves were at their most colorful. The streets were already lined with pumpkins, little plastic skeletons, and candy-corn lights. It was, admittedly, his favorite part of the season. He parked in front of a coffee shop and ordered something fluffy without much of anything in it. It wouldn’t do to have caffeine so close to bed. He was on call, after all.

The air was nice and sharp, a pleasant contrast to the overworking heaters in his car, and there was a slight wind that chilled the tips of his ears. He marveled at how quickly it was getting dark. Leonard itched to do a quick walk around the block, knowing that he should get home, but a poster stopped him.

Come Support ENTERPRISE Theatre!

 _A Collection of Laughs_ , Rated R, 6:30 to 7:30 pm.  
September 18-21

Written by the Cast and Crew  
$7 for adults, $5 for seniors

Enterprise theatre opens in December.

 

 _Well_ , he thought, _why the hell not?_ It was only an hour. He had plenty of time. And he’d have something to tell Jo about.

Leonard followed his cell phone GPS to a modern-looking building off of main street. The ceiling was industrial and the colors fairly neutral, not at all the gaudy reds and yellows he had come to expect from buildings that housed plays. He thought it looked more like the dance studios he had gone to with Jocelyn than a theatre. He followed the doors to an intimate stage set with charcoal grey reclining seats. It was large and very clean, the seats were new, and it smelled like pleasant cleaner instead of cigarettes and greasy popcorn. There were two other people in the audience, which was a bit pitiful, but he _was_ a half an hour early. The house lights were dimmed slightly and the stage was fully lit with chairs scattered around on it, some of them knocked over.

“Sorry, I’m sorry sir,” said a young man with an accent as he ran head-first into Leonard’s back.

He apologized in turn, made sure that the kid hadn’t gotten a bloody nose, and sat down a few rows form the front. Tiny-Russian dashed up started gathering together the mess on stage. There were a few other techies running back and forth from the entryway to the curtain stairs.

“Hey everybody—” the mic squealed. “Oh, damn, sorry. Uh. Is it safe now, Scotty?”

“Good to go,” shouted a man from the sound booth.

“Thanks!” A young man in his late twenties hopped up onto the stage, set a chair on its side, and sat on it. “I see you have found our mess of a stage. Do you mind if I re-set our first impression?” he said, beaming directly at Leonard. He felt himself turn bright red.

All lights abruptly turned off, followed by the Windows startup jingle. There was a thump, a thud, and a curse before the stage was lit again by the foremost overheads. All of the chairs had been scattered across stage left yet again. On the right, the unidentified young man was sitting normally as if nothing had happened.

“So,” he said, “I doubt many more people are going to show up. We put the posters out ten minutes ago, it was a spontaneous thing, really, spurned into action by Christine, our marketing manager. Hey, Christine,” he said and waved to a girl in the audience that Leonard had not previously identified.

She waved back looking apprehensively amused.

“Anyway, I’m Jim. You might’ve seen some of us over the last few years doing an assortment of plays for the Windgrove Theatre Troupe, but we left them. They no longer have good actors.” He blew a kiss and wiggled his fingers at the door. “No, but really, they’re great. We’ve been wanting to settle down for a couple years now and we are pretty excited that we finally found a place to do it. This,” Jim continued, “is our first attempt at raising money for our very own business in this delightful space. We’ve collectively decided to call it Enterprise.”

Someone in the back cheered. Leonard clapped out of obligation.

“But none of you really care about that, so I suppose we could get on with it. Christine will be by with the programs she literally just typed up if you’d like one.”

The lights on stage left slowly dimmed and a spotlight hit Jim just in time for him to say, “take it away, Uhura!” and the room darkened again.

A woman with long dark hair stood over one of the many scattered chairs, lit by a soft, warm glow that made him lean forward in his seat. She kicked it lightly.

She was clearly a dancer, he noted as she leaped over one chair and another, singing about how lovely it was that she killed her husband. It wasn’t getting any laughs out of the other members of the audience, but he was grinning like an idiot by the time Christine got around to passing out the programs. He didn’t open it; he wanted to watch every second of what was happening on stage.

And of course the transition was as ridiculous as he had expected it to be. She danced to the other side of the stage where the lights followed her to reveal Jim in a different costume laying dramatically dead on the ground. She hopped behind the curtains with a flick of her middle finger and he sat up to begin the next sketch.

“Okay,” he said, “I’m gonna need a volunteer.”

Nobody moved.

“I’m gonna need a volunteer that has brown hair, is wearing a blue button down shirt, and looks grumpy.”

Leonard groaned.

“Awww, come on,” Jim said, hopping from the stage, over one set of chairs, sliding under another like a child, and finally emerging next to Leonard. “Please? Pretty please with a cherry on top?” he batted his eyelashes and grinned when McCoy leaned as far away from the younger man as possible.

“I’ll make it worth your while,” Jim said with a wink.

“Do I have to pay you to _not_?” he said a smile trying to break free anyway.

Jim grabbed him by his hand and yanked him out of his seat. “I’ll be nice, I promise.”

“Ugh.”

“Alright everybody, this is Bones,” Jim said, patting Leonard nicely on the shoulder.

“Why?” he asked, and was awarded no response.

“Bones is going to let me show him some magic tricks,” he said with a grin, pulling a police cap out of nowhere and placing it on his head. “But first, I’m going to need to make sure you don’t have a weapon.”

“Is this your excuse to fondle me?” Leonard asked, evading one attempt at a pat test. Jim finally managed a grab, directly on his ass, and he jumped about a foot in the air.

“AHA!” he said, pretending to pull something out of Leonard’ back pocket. It was a terribly floppy jester’s hat with one bell missing and a rather disgusting color scheme. He slipped it on over the police one. “Found it. Truly dangerous, good sir.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t go for the gun,” he said.

“Gun?” Jim said, blinking innocently.

“Yeah, the one in my—” Jim lunged forward and Leonard batted him away. “Don’t you dare!”

There were several snickers from the audience.

“Fine, fine,” he said, wilting exaggeratedly. “Well. I don’t suppose you’d be willing to give me a shot anyway?”

“Cute,” he said. “You’re quite the joker, aren’t you?”

Jim leaned back, scandalized, with a hand to his chest and a leg in the air. The bells on his new hat rang.

 

The house lights always jarred him slightly, no matter how gently they were turned on, because it was like stepping out of a dream. It made him feel anxious, like he had fallen asleep at work and missed something. He checked his watch. 7:21. Leonard didn’t know what he was waiting for. He didn’t have anything to get to.

“Hey,” said a voice from the stage. Jim jumped down, his bright hair damp and a light patch on his cheek where the tape from his mic had torn the makeup off.

Leonard smiled. “That was pretty great, kid. I’m sure you’re gonna be successful in this…enterprise of yours.”

He offered a handshake and Jim latched onto his elbow like a monkey.

“Yeah, actually,” he said, watching the lasts of the guests (some had come in late) filter through the door. “I think you had a big part in that. Are you an actor? Because _damn_ was that magic skit good.”

He snickered. “Far from it. I was just saying what I ordinarily would.”

Jim narrowed his eyes. “No, I don’t think so. I think you were putting on a show. I think that if I gave you a script, you’d blow me away.”

“Oh, boy. You don’t know how wrong you are. I auditioned for a part in college once.” He laughed as Jim’s expression begged for a story. “To impress a girl of course. Jim, the director actually took me aside to tell me that he didn’t want me to embarrass myself anymore.”

“Oh, gosh.”

“Yeah, gosh.”

Jim looked a little disappointed. “Damn, I was hoping to hire a new permanent actor. I’ve got Uhura of course, and Sulu, but I lost Ethan and Terrance to a different studio when we split.”

Leonard jumped onto the edge of the stage, sitting on top of a plethora of tape-marked X’s and chalk scratches on the black matte plywood. There was a profane drawing in what looked to be white crayon beneath a discarded piece of ribbon. It looked pretty shitty. Jim caught him staring.

“That’s the first thing we’re going to replace,” he said. “We probably won’t have enough from this turnout, but Nyota’s gonna start dance lessons in the next room over and I’ll be teaching some vocals.” He sighed wistfully. “You don’t happen to play any instruments, do you?”

Leonard shook his head. “I can play ode to joy, but that’s about it.”

“Damn,” Jim said, tipping backwards and splaying his arms out. “I need a pianist. I don’t know how I managed to get here without one.”

Leonard frowned. He was hesitant to mention it, but… “Actually,” he said, and Jim sat bolt upright, “I think I might know someone.”

His next-door neighbor was about as sociable as an angry cat, but damn was he talented. They had talked maybe three times despite their farm houses being about as close as the fields would allow. He saw Spock leave for work every morning, so it wouldn’t be hard to catch him. It was just a matter of _talking_ to him. Which, it might be noted, was a challenge in itself.

“Yeah. My neighbor. He doesn’t talk much, but I heard him play at a wedding once. Jazz, classical, pretty much everything, I think.”

Jim’s eyes brightened. “Jazz?” he said.

“Y…yeah?”

“Perfect. Bones, if you bring him here, I will be forever in your debt.”

He blinked. “Bones?”

Jim shrugged.

He didn’t want to talk to Spock at all if he could help it, but these people were talented. They could probably go far, if they wanted to. He looked at Jim’s wide blue eyes and the pitiful arrangement of the boxes that were just visible behind the curtain and caved. The least he could do was ask.

“Yeah, alright. I’ll bring him by after the performance tomorrow. I’ve got my daughter, so I won’t be able to see you perform again, but I’m sure she can entertain herself while I introduce you.”

Jim nodded eagerly. “Uhura can show her the costume room if that’d be something she’s interested in.”

“Jim,” he laughed, “I think she’d love you forever.”

“Great!” he said. “It’s a date, then.”

Leonard rolled his eyes and hopped from the stage. “You have a good night, now. And tell everyone that they did an incredible job.”

“Will do!” he called.

 

Okay. Spock. He had to talk to Spock. The kitchen timer was going off and he had forgotten about the glass of water that was under the running faucet and the toast was smelling a little bit burnt. Joanna was looking at him like he was completely out of his mind, which, to be fair, he might have been. He did another lap around the kitchen.

“What do I do, Jo? Do I make him food? Do you do that if you already know each other?”

She shrugged, her chin in her hands and her elbows on the counter. “It’s not a bribe. That would be weird,” she pointed out.

“True. The how do I breach this? I can’t invite him over for a cup of coffee if it’s at his house. And I’m not gonna wave him down from the road, either.”

She sighed, taking pity on him and getting out the peanut butter. “Why don’t you just ask to buy him one?”

He stared at her, dry toast half eaten. “Did I ever tell you that you are the most intelligent kid our family has ever popped out?”

She made a face.

He checked the time. Spock had left at 7:30 on the dot every morning since he had moved in (with the exception of Sundays) and returned precisely at 5:15. He should already be home. Leonard peeked out the window and saw the burgundy hybrid parked beneath a pine tree. He threw on his jacket.

“Wish me luck, Jo.”

“Good luck,” she repeated monotonously.

“You know who to call if I get murdered?”

“He’s not gonna kill you, Dad, just _go._ ”

“Okay, alright, jeez.”

He closed the door behind him, counted to five, and then opened it back up.

“Should I walk or drive?” he asked her, and she threw her napkin at him.

“Go!”

He walked to Spock’s house, enjoying the crisp smell of afternoon September air and the chill on his ears. They had trees lining their gravel driveway, a funny combination of poplar and pine and spruce. He passed a pile of leaves and shamelessly kicked it. Spock's fields were loaned out, he believed, and they were currently filled with corn as tall as himself. Most of Leonard’s land was for hay, but he kept an acre or so free and hired neighborhood kids in the summer to do harvesting and maintenance on his vegetables. They thought it was fun and their mothers (especially the single ones) sent food they had made with his produce. He’d send Jo out with water balloons every once in awhile and that was fun, too. Things were more relaxed since he’d requested less hours. They hired a new doctor, and he was perfectly pleased with his schedule. He had Jo more now, and this time he was going to do it right. 

Leonard stepped up the faded wood steps and knocked on his door. Spock’s face appeared behind the screen almost immediately. “Doctor. How may I help you?”

He decided not to beat around the bush. “I got something to run by you,” he said. “Now a good time?”

Spock flicked his eyes at the door as if thinking _should I let him in?_ He looked reluctant, but he cracked the door open anyway. Leonard took that as a yes.

“So, I know you’re a busy guy, Spock,” he said, wiping his feet on the brown mat next to the door, “but I learned about an opportunity that you might find interesting. It’s musical in nature.”

He frowned. “Musical?” he asked, leaving the screen open a crack.

“Yeah. You hear about the group that’s starting up a theatre in town? Enterprise?”

“I have not,” he said.

Leonard peeked around a corner, not trying to be nosy but a little bit curious anyway, and was immediately assaulted by a black cat.

“Hi there,” he said, scratching it between the ears. It purred at him insistently.

“Would it be appropriate to offer you coffee?” Spock asked, eyebrow raised as McCoy planted himself on the floor so his new friend could crawl all over him.

“Actually, the director was going to do the offering. He’s been looking for a musician. When I told him you did Jazz, he nearly jumped me. I’m not sure what he’s got in mind, but we were hoping you’d stop by after their performance tomorrow.” He saw a spark of intrigue in Spock’s eyes and he knew (hoped) that he had him hooked. “Jim’s a real talented guy. You should see the act this weekend if you can. It’s a little bit burlesque at times, kinda quirky, but damn, the guy sure knows how to put on a show.”

Spock nodded slowly. “At what time did he wish to meet?”

“Show ends at seven thirty,” he said. “Starts an hour before.”

“I believe I will be able to attend both,” he said, now squatting down in the entryway to be on McCoy’s level, careful not to disrupt his perfect placement of items. It was funny how a man could be so ordered and strict in appearance but have such a varied repertoire.

“Really?” he asked, beaming. He didn’t know why he was so happy. He wouldn’t even be involved past their meeting.

“Indeed,” Spock said.

“I could drive you,” McCoy offered before his brain could process it. “I was hoping to go again tomorrow. And it’d be environmentally friendly and all,” he added. “Joanna had a sleepover party, so he was free as a bird. If he was going to admit it, seeing Jim again was an appealing thought.

“Yes, that seems logical.”

“Great!” he said, sticking his hand out. Spock shook it rather hesitantly. “See you at five forty-five?”

He nodded.

 

“You came!” Jim said, launching himself at them. He hugged Leonard around the waist, sending them both back a few steps. Spock stepped away, the movement drawing Jim’s eyes. “You’re the musician?”

“So it seems,” Spock said.

Jim beamed. “Excellent. No daughter today, Bones?”

He shook his head. “At a friend’s house.”

There must have been something in that statement that lit Jim’s mischievous sense because his smile turned decidedly conniving. “C’mon, sit down, sit down.” He pulled them both into the front row seats.

“So. I’m looking for someone to fill the position of music director, a position that I’m not positive you’re open to, but in a more immediate sense, I need a pianist.”

“I told him that much on the way here,” Leonard said.

Jim nodded approvingly. “Great. Mind if I ask what kind of stuff you can play?”

Spock raised an eyebrow. “I _can_ play anything you require, Mr…”

“Oh, shit, introductions. Guess I got a little excited. I’m Jim Kirk, you can call me Jim.”

“Very well. I am Spock.”

“Nice to meet you, Spock.”

“Leonard mentioned that you were particularly interested in Jazz?”

He nodded. “Yeah, the majority of the productions that I’ve been in have had jazz or swing undertones, but I’m open to other music styles.”

Spock looked considering. Leonard felt nervous, as if he was the one on the hot plate, but the two of them seemed to be perfectly in their element. “I am a professor at the university,” Spock said, “so I do not have the time for a full-time job.”

Jim shook his head. “You’d be needed for the startup, just to get things going, and then probably not again until just before tech week. Obviously, that’d require you to learn the pieces at home, but… and anyway, you’d be paid per program, a percentage that we can negotiate later on. The first one we do I’m hoping to make community oriented, just to establish ourselves a bit here, but after that we’re going to be breaking out the fancy stuff.”

“I assume, then, that you would like to hear me play.”

Jim raised his eyebrows. “You assume correctly.”

Spock gave him a look that clearly said, _give me the sheet music and I’ll play for you._

“Oh, uh. Wow. Okay, hold on.” Jim hopped onto the stage, ran behind the curtain, and came back carrying a dozen yellow booklets. “There’s gotta be something in here.”

He juggled them for a couple more seconds before Leonard held out his hands. “Give them to me if you aren’t going to use them.” Three or four scripts were dumped into his hands.

“Aha,” Jim said, waving a rather well-worn copy, “This I can do. Bones, is there the—yeah, thanks.”

He held both booklets open, looked at them for a second, and sighed.

“Hold on a second, I’m gonna go find Uhura.”

“Jim,” Leonard said, interrupting his thought process. “Why don’t you just pick one that you know? Spock's the one auditioning.”

Jim stared. “Well, I know all of them…hmm. Hmm. Alright then. Bones, take this. You’re Skye.”

“What? I’m what?”

“Should be page 126,” he said, tossing him the booklet. It fluttered before it landed on top of the others that still occupied his lap.

He flipped it open. “Oh, Jesus, Jim, you know what I told you about the—”

“Just read his lines, Bones!” Jim said, skipping over to Spock to give him the music.

Spock looked at it once, raised both eyebrows, and said, “Give me the cue.”

Jim nodded. “I’ll snap my fingers.”

“Very well.” He played a chord from middle C, then up to G. It seemed to gain his approval.

“Alright, Bones, ready?”

“As I’ll ever be,” he muttered, thinking that the script looked vaguely familiar.

“Doesn’t Bacardi have alcohol in it?” Jim said, leaning over the arm rest to steal Leonard’s water.

He glanced at the lines. “Only enough to act as a preservative,” he assured him.

“You know,” Jim said, grabbing both of his hands, “this would be a wonderful way to get children to drink milk!” He took a slug of the water bottle and snapped his fingers.

McCoy tried not to laugh. “Woah, slow down sister, you alright?” he said, rather monotonously.

“Am I alright? Ask…me…how do I feel,” Jim said, pulling Leonard out of his seat.

“No, no, this was not what we agreed on,” he managed, right before Jim broke into song.

“Ask me now that we’re cozy and cllllllinging,” he sang, attempting to pull Leonard into a sorely executed twirl, “Well, sir, all I can say is if I were a bell I’d be ringing!”

“Go bother Uhura,” he laughed, shaking Jim off. Uhura was indeed on the stage, eyebrow raised and arms crossed. She seemed to like seeing Leonard suffer.

Jim took his advice, unfortunately for her, and leaped onto the stage. She allowed the dance that followed, which ended in her dipping him, one of the most amusing things Leonard thought he had ever seen. Jim didn’t stay stationary, though, and soon enough, Spock was the next on his list of people to antagonize.

“Ask me how do I feel from this chemistry lesson I’m learning,” he sang, leaning over the piano.

“Chemistry?” Spock echoed, lips twitching.

“Yeah, chemistry!”

Uhura hopped off of the stage and quietly sat down next to him, helping to pick up the booklets that had dropped off of his lap when Jim decided that he wanted to dance.

“Of course he couldn’t just ask me to sing my song,” she whispered in his ear, and he snorted.

“That might be my fault,” he admitted. “I told him to sing what he knew.”

“No,” she said back to him, “that’s just Jim. He does enjoy showing off.”

“You were the ones that did this in July?”

“You were there?”

“Yeah. Joanna and I went to the last showing. She was begging me to go to another one.” He recalled their radiance onstage, the way Uhura had slapped someone right across the face in one of the songs. His memories were much fonder now that he knew who produced it. It was increasingly disappointing that he hadn’t gone a day earlier and saw it one more time.

Jim finished his song with a whoop, clapping Spock on the shoulder and grinning. The ring of music still echoed up the rows of seats. Leonard clapped and wiggled his eyebrows at Spock.

“Mr. Spock, I think we could work well together,” Jim said, eyes practically shining. “What do you say we get coffee tomorrow, fine-tune things?”

“That is agreeable. I do not have classes, but I will be in town.”

“Great, give me your phone number,” he said, practically shoving the device into Spock’s hands.

He obliged, and Jim sent a quick text.

“I’m free whenever you are, perks of owning your own business, so just shoot me a message sometime at a reasonable hour.”

“I will do so,” Spock promised, rising from the piano bench. He turned to Leonard. “I believe we should be heading back.”

Jim’s eyebrows shot up in the air.

“We carpooled,” he clarified with a glare.

“Of course.” Jim grabbed at the air next to Leonard’s pocket. “Give me your phone too, Bones. I have an idea I’d like to run past you.”

He handed over his phone and Jim happily typed in his information. “Text me later tonight, if you will. I’ve gotta get this cleaned up for tomorrow.”

“Sure, kid,” McCoy said, standing up and nodding to Spock.

There was a long period of silence as he warmed up his car. He glanced over at Spock, whose face was lit by the lamp in front of Jim’s building. He seemed pensive, but not negatively so. McCoy wasn’t too sure how to breach the conversation barrier that had been between them since they met.

“Sorry how random this was, Spock. I know we’ve never really talked, but…”

Spock shook his head. “I was open to the offer. I stopped teaching music, so I had hoped to add it back into my schedule another way.”

“Yeah,” he said, shifting into reverse and pulling out of the parking spot. “Thanks for coming, anyway.”

“Of course.”

They left the town and the streetlights in favor of a two-lane road heading back east. The sun was down, it was just dark enough so that his headlights wouldn’t make any difference, and the world looked black and white.

“How long have you known Jim Kirk?” asked Spock, startling him.

“Uh. Two days?”

Spock stared.

“I know I just met him, but…I don’t know. He grows on you. Really fast.”

There were several things that he would expect a normal person to say, like “you seem to be willing to do an awful lot for him,” or “that’s a little bit weird, don’t you think?” This was Spock, though. He just nodded.

“That he does,” he said quietly.

“You mind if I turn on the radio?” McCoy asked.

“Please do,” he replied.

He flicked through pop, folk, and country before landing on soft classic rock. Neither of them talked on the way back. It was a comfortable drive. He was happy to listen to the radio and the hiss from the failing seal in the driver’s side door and watch carefully for deer. He didn’t feel forced to make conversation as was often the case. Spock seemed content to sit in silence, watching the stars as they began to show.

When he dropped the other man off, Spock thanked him and retreated into his house. Leonard wasn’t too keen to do the same; it would be lonely without Joanna. It was ridiculous how quickly he had accustomed to her presence. For years she had been living with her mother in a different state. Now he had her a week at a time in the summer and weekends (with Fridays) during school and it was more than he could have asked for, yes, but not quite enough. Tomorrow after work he’d take her out to the Chinese place that she liked so much and let her rent a movie. Soon enough Monday would come and her mother would pick her up and drop her at school and it would be days before he saw her again.

He sucked up his reluctance and trudged into the house.

 

The phone rang. He rubbed the sleep from his eyes, flipped over, and patted his nightstand for his phone. It buzzed. The caller ID said Magic Man, and he most certainly did not recall entering anyone into his phone under that caller ID. It could only be one person.

“What,” he said to it.

“Bones? Are you asleep? It’s like eleven,” came a familiar and far too excited voice.

He groaned. “Jim, I’m an old man, dammit, let me sleep.”

“Sorry! Not, actually, though, it’s a Friday, I mean, come on,” Jim said, sounding restless.

Leonard flopped back down in bed with the phone to his ear. “So,” he said, “What did you need?”

“Right! So, Uhura was listening to our performance today, right? And she’s kind of my co-leader, and she approved of him wholeheartedly, and I just got everything cleaned up and nice for tomorrow’s show and I’m just like. Oh my god, Bones, he’s perfect. I need him. Bones, Bones, Bones…”

Leonard rolled his eyes. “Then ask him out, Jim, you don’t need to call me.” _I don’t even know you._

“Not like that, jeez! Well. I mean, he—okay, no.”

“You’ve got a meeting with him tomorrow.”

“What if he decides not to? What if he’s too busy?”

“Jim,” he said, kicking his sheets off, “I talked to him on the way home and he seemed genuinely interested.”

“Really?”

“Really,” he assured him

“Well, what about you, then?”

“What about me?” he repeated, standing up and adjusting his shorts.

Jim paused, and he could picture the look on his face. It occurred to him again that there was something strange about how attached he had become in so little time. He bit his lip. Falling fast, be it into a friendship or a partnership frequently crashed catastrophically.

“Well, I was thinking about how good you were on stage and how natural you are with organization. I’ve never been on my own before, directed my own thing, ya know? But there always has been a stage manager around, and I think you’d be really good at it,” Jim said, wind crackling in the background.

“Which means what, exactly?”

“You basically organize a bunch of information and help the backstage, the director, and the actors communicate. You’d…sort of be the production dad.”

It was tempting. Incredibly so. It would give him something to take his mind off of work when his daughter wasn’t there, and it would give him the social interaction that he had been denying himself for years. On the other hand, it would be a lot of work.

“I’ll think ‘bout it,” he said.

“Thanks.”

He was sure Jim was smiling.

 

Two days later, he knocked on Spock’s door with a plate of cookies that he and Jo had made.

“Hey,” he called through the open screen door. He heard footsteps on the creaky floor to the front of the room.

“Doctor McCoy,” he said, tilting his head.

“That’s a little formal, don’t you think?”

“Very well.” He opened the door for McCoy to step in with the plate. “Can I help you with something?”

“Nah, I actually came to see your cat,” he said with a smile, holding the plate of cookies out. “No, I thought I should make you a plate when I asked you to join the crew the other day but my daughter thought it would have looked like a bribe, so she insisted I bring some with me today instead.”

Spock tilted his head. “In that case, give her my thanks.”

“We couldn’t remember if you were vegetarian or vegan, so they’re vegan.”

“Vegetarian,” he said, “but thank you.”

“What’s your cat’s name?” he asked.

“Her name is Cat,” Spock said.

Leonard smiled. “Hello,” he said to Cat, “I’m sorry you have such a boring name.” He lifted her and put her on his shoulder. She purred. “So,” he continued, “did you and Jim work something out?”

“I believe we did,” Spock said, removing a cookie from the tray and taking a cautious bite.

“And?”

“I have agreed to take the position of the music director for their next performance. If we are pleased with the arrangement after, I will continue as a permanent member of their…organization,” Spock explained.

Leonard nodded and sat down on a stool next to Spock. The cat climbed off of him and jumped to the floor, training after his master for crumbs.

“Jim asked me to be the stage manager,” he said, glancing at a picture of a beautiful woman and a man that looked very like Spock.

“Are you considering it?”

“More than considering, really. I want to,” he admitted.

Spock handed him a glass of water and he accepted it, running his thumb along the edge.

“Is this weird, Spock? People like us joining people like them?”

“In what way?” Spock asked, sitting down beside him.

Leonard shrugged. “I don’t know. We’re older, I guess.”

“Not that much older,” he pointed out.

“We’ve got jobs. Other than that, I mean. I’ve got a kid and a property, we’ve…”

“You seem to by attempting to talk yourself out of it,” Spock noted.

Leonard shrugged. “Why did you agree to it, then?”

Spock took another cookie and held it out to Leonard, who bit into it half-heartedly.

“I accepted Jim’s offer because I wanted to,” he said.

“Real helpful, Spock, thanks.”

“I accepted,” Spock continued, looking at him with eyes that were undoubtedly psychoanalyzing every detail of their conversation, “because I enjoy theatre, and the music of theatre, and the lights of the stage. It may not be logical to attempt such an undertaking with my current course load, but I believe that my participation will benefit both myself and the audience that will inevitably view it.”

Leonard wanted to smile at his description, such color from such a dry man, but he managed to control his expression. “I don’t think I’d be contributing as much as you would, Spock. I’d be calling out lines when people forgot and telling Jim to take off his microphone before sleeps with it on,” he said.

“Do you believe that being a teacher has no meaning in society?” the other man said, “that being a father has nothing to do with the development of a child?”

“Of course not,” he said.

“Then I see no reason for your insecurities.”

“That’s a little bit…"

“Leonard,” Spock said, jarring him from his daze. “I am not urging you to join us, nor am I attempting to convince you otherwise. I will, however, point out that you were the one to invite me.”

He didn’t quite know what to say to that. He had, he supposed, become an agent of Jim at that meeting, whether he liked it or not. He could. Even if he couldn’t do much for the production, maybe he could help the rest of them make it. And, well, he hadn’t done anything just for the heck of it in years. It might do him some good.

“Thanks, Spock. I’ve got to go talk to the lady of the house.” Spock nodded and watched him silently as he dashed out the door and down the driveway.

 

“Jim?” he said after having deliberately set his alarm for one in the morning.

“What the hell, Bones, do you know what time it is?”

“Just about time to wake you up, I had hoped,” he said, smirking at how rough Jim sounded.

“Did you do this on purpose? You did, didn’t you, asshole.”

“What makes you say that?” he said with false innocence.

There was a yawn. “The fact that you…wait. Does this mean you’ll do it?”

“No.”

“What?!”

“Just kidding, when do we start?”

“This is revenge, isn’t it?” Jim said, sounding pleased all the same.

“It sure is,” he said.

 

He was to meet Jim to help decide their program on Tuesday when he would also officially greet the majority of the cast and crew. Spock picked him up, and he hopped in with a canteen of hot tea for Spock and coffee for himself as some sort of preparation for whatever they were about to experience. When they arrived, he sipped calmly at his drink, trying not to overthink anything as Spock got all of his sheet music in order. The leaves on the tree in front of the studio had fallen in a hurry and Jim put up a ‘COMING SOON’ poster on the corkboard outside. The advertisements from the other night had been torn down, but he spotted one inside the door beneath a display of glass. The first program they had done in their own theatre. He could understand that.

The boy that had bumped into him the first night greeted them at the door. He identified himself as Pavel Chekov, an apparent special effect whiz and the one who managed their lighting. Leonard greeted him while Spock raised an eyebrow.

“Mr. Chekov,” he said.

“Professor,” the boy stammered. “Um.”

“I believe our task was to meet with Jim. Would you care to guide us to him?”

“Of course!” he said, dashing towards the door.

There was a little basement room underneath the stage that he led them to. A table was stacked with papers and boxes and random items. There were several people gathered tightly around the only open space. There was an actual camping lantern hanging from a ceiling hook above them.

“Hello,” Uhura waved from her little stool. “Everybody, this is Spock, temporary music director, and Leonard, temporary stage manager. Looks like you already met Pavel.”

“I’m Scotty,” said a man wearing the ghastliest combination of plaid and denim he had ever seen, “I run sound and…pretty much everything mechanical.”

“Sulu,” said a quiet man Leonard had never seen before. “I’m directing alongside Jim. I tell him where to go, he tells everyone else where to go.”

“Nice to meet you both,” he said, shaking hands.

“I’m Christine, I think we met at comedy night!”

“I believe we did. Good to see you again,” he said. “And you?”

The girl who was flipping pages in a book so quickly she couldn’t possibly have been reading them glanced up. “Oh, sorry,” she said, sticking her hand out. “Janice Rand. Design.”

He smiled. “Pleased to work with all of you.”

“I as well,” Spock said.

“So.” Jim tromped down the stairs. “Now that you guys are all acquainted, I guess we can get to the good stuff.”

“I talked to Pike,” Nyota said, handing a list to Christine, who glanced at it and winced. “For those who don’t know, Chris is our sponsor and the leader of one of the most prolific theatre and cinema agencies in the state. He’s going to be sending us actors that he wants to get proper experience. He also provides us with a list of plays that he ‘strongly suggests we choose from’ as they will not have had in-state contracts within the last three years. Here’s what we’ve got for this next season.” She passed another list off to Jim, who winced.

“Oh boy,” he said.

“What are they?” asked Scotty.

Leonard waiting patiently in his chair next to Spock, fairly certain that his presence was decorative at best. He elbowed the other man for something to do. Spock glared.

Jim shook the paper with his usual level of dramatics and read the first name. “Carousel.”

There was silence.

“Well,” he said, “I saw that _once_ and it was _bad_. Like, they talk about clams the entire time. I’m making an executive decision and ruling that one out, guys.”

“Seconded,” Sulu said, wincing. “Not great for a community cast.”

“Or an audience below the age of sixty,” Janice said, twirling a bright pink pen between her fingers. It was pretty easy to tell that she was the costume designer of the bunch. Her hair was so ridiculous that it looked like it might have a life of its own.

Jim cleared his throat. “Okay. Number 2: Cinderella.”

Leonard winced. Jim looked at him with a questioning eye. “Overdone,” he said.

There were a few nods of assent.

“Agreed,” said Uhura.

“Alrighty then,” Jim said. “I’m gonna throw a few more out on the table here: Little Shop of Horrors, eh, not really the season, Singing in the Rain, maybe not, and…oooh.”

“Oooh?” Scotty echoed, leaning over Sulu to look at the list. “Oooh,” he agreed.

“That could be fun,” Jim said.

“What is it?” Chekov asked, looking rather pitiful from the other end of the table.

Bones tugged the list from Jim’s hands.

“The remainder of the selection is: Bye Bye Birdy, School of Rock, and Evita,” he read. “Since we don’t have a diverse enough cast for Evita and Bye Bye Birdy would be physically painful, I’m guessing that Jim’s excitement stems from School of Rock.”

It would be fun, he’d give it that. And if Jim was looking for this to be a community project, it was a good place to start. Modern but not unheard of, musical but not opera. Kids were hard to work with, though. He knew Uhura taught dance, so maybe she was confident enough to deal with them.

“What do you think, Spock?” he asked, spinning on his chair to catch a glimpse of the other man.

“Hiring a set of musicians to play this style of music will be fairly simple. I can recommend a few from the music program at the university,” he said.

Christine already had a pen out and was jotting down notes. “I say it sounds like a good idea. I was hoping it would be a polar opposite to Guys and Dolls. It will help establish us as a separate theatre.”

Leonard nodded in approval.

“Bones,” Jim said, “You’ve got a kid. How difficult is it going to be to get kids that can play?”

He shrugged. “Not very. There is a band group for every elementary school in town, plus church groups, plus independent trainers. You’re going to have a long group for auditions. I’m betting that you can get the school system to send out a letter, but you’d have to talk to the community board and get approval. It’s not required, but you will get a lot more of a positive reception if you do,” he said.

“Done and done,” said Christine.

“And verify a teaching certification if you have one,” he said.

“Both Jim and I do,” Uhura confirmed.

“Well, then,” he said, turning red at the attention.

 

Act 2: Setting the Stage: November

 

A month flew by. Between work, Joanna, and the play, he hardly had time to think. It was nice. Jo adored doing her weekend homework in the back of the theatre, in fact, Leonard had never heard less complaining about the subject. Her grades rose a bit, too. Her mother was even happy with him. Spirits were high, but they had risen to a point that was a little more on the tense side of the spectrum. By the time auditions came around, Jim had taken to constant hyperventilation.

Auditions were, for lack of a better word, terrible. One of the teachers at the elementary school brought her entire class in, talent be damned. Not a single one of them could find a C note. At about the thirty-fifth kid to stand up and perform his song, Jim was vibrating in his seat.

“Do you need a break?” Leonard asked, pushing Jim’s hands away from caffeine.

“Yes.”

“Jim. Spock, Uhura and I can handle this without you. Go get a sandwich.”

Jim whined and let his forehead thump against the table. “But if you guys have to suffer, so should I!”

“And if you’re sitting here mouth breathing,” Uhura said, “you’re the source of the suffering.”

Spock raised an eyebrow that they had all come to decipher as “she has a point.”

“How much longer do we have?” Leonard asked, patting the back of Jim’s head.

“Half an hour,” Spock replied. Even he sounded exhausted.

“Half an hour left of round one,” Jim sighed. “Can Scotty and Sulu switch with us?”

“I’ll ask them how far they are on mics,” Uhura said, waving as she hopped onto the stage and behind the curtain.

“Did she just leave us?” Jim whined.

“I’m afraid so, kid.”

He sighed loudly into the table.

 

“Oh my god, guys, you have to get me drunk as soon as possible. I don’t want to think ever again. I’m gonna direct a horror movie. Starring children singing. When I said this would be a community project, I had NO IDEA this was the kind of crop we would dredge up,” Jim said, stumbling towards Leonard’s car.

“Alright,” McCoy said, pulling on the neckline of the tattered red flannel shirt that he was sure Jim wore just because he made a scathing comment about it once. He hauled the younger man out of the passenger seat. “I can’t have you freaking out next to me while I’m driving.”

“I suggest we get something to eat and forgo the alcohol,” Spock said, taking his spot next to Leonard in the car. Jim pouted.

“I agree. Jim’s gone a little hypoglycemic, I think.”

“Alcohol has nutrition,” Jim argued.

“Hell no. You’re going to eat what we put in front of you. If I have to force feed you like a child, I will,” he promised.

Spock nodded at him approvingly.

“Bones? Did you lock the door? What the hell?”

“That actually wasn’t me, nice going, Spock.”

“Of course,” he said with a tiny smirk.

 

They pulled up to an Italian restaurant, one that McCoy was sure had vegetarian options. Despite his protests, they had to stop Jim from seating himself. If there was one thing that hadn’t changed during the last month or so, it was the rate at which Leonard was being sucked into the tight-knit group that had become his social life. He now knew Jim’s complete medical history as a result of an unfortunate accident with some peanut butter, Spock's low-key hatred of Katy Perry, and Scotty’s huge crush on his car. He was pretty sure they all had plenty of dirt on him, too. Most of it was a result of Jim’s constant talking about any and every fleeting thought that entered his head.

“I told you what Chekov is gonna do with the classroom scene, right?” Jim said.

“Yes, you did.”

Spock speared a pea pod on his fork. “I do not believe I know,” he said.

Jim brightened, glanced at Leonard, and made a point to swallow before gesticulating wildly with his fork.

“So. I wanted a drop/down of the alphabet and the solar system and stuff you’d usually see in a classroom? But Chekov, and I agree wholeheartedly, don’t get me wrong, thought that it would be too distracting. So he compromised with having desks piled up on stage right. He’s got some idea for lighting it to make it seem sort of surreal. I don’t really understand him when he gets to talking that fast, but, well. He’s gonna stick them on a pallet and drill some wheels on the pallet, and then we’re going to cover it up with speakers. It’ll be less minimalist than what I think he was hoping for, but we’re gonna need something to make it interesting for the kids during rehearsals, too.” He casually transferred a small pile of carrots to Spock’s plate.

Leonard raised an eyebrow at Spock’s nonchalant acceptance of the trespassing.

“Eat your plants,” he said.

“And for the in-the-house scenes?” Spock asked.

“I haven’t decided just yet,” Jim said. “I’m thinking a lidless lamp and a couch with a mattress pad below it. So I’ll fall off of one onto the other like it’s a thing the character does every day.”

Jim had cast himself as Dewey Finn and everyone had agreed. He did have the best voice, after all, and it would make more sense by way of theatre representation to have one of their professionals be the main character. Sulu wasn’t acting in this one, he had taken to directing alongside Jim, and Uhura was heading the dance choreography. The rest of the crew already had their assigned tasks. Scotty had gone to every garage sale in the last month looking for cheap musical equipment that he could repair and/or destroy for parts. They had a rather large pile of amps and amateur microphones stuffed in the changing room. 

Spock had his work cut out for him. They had recruited a very talented guitarist, but they weren’t sure what part he would play, if a part at all. The next step was to appropriately cast all of the kids, judge their musical ability, and assign extra band members for offstage when the time came. Leonard sighed into his soup. They had a lot to do.

Jim’s food-high crashed about ten minutes later, and Spock nudged him gently toward the car until he collapsed in the back seat. Leonard turned the heat on for a minute before they took off.

“Should we bring him back to his car?” he asked, glancing at the two of them in rearview mirror. Jim was slumped against the door and Spock leaned over to correct a patch of hair that had gone awry some time during the night.

“He has a very short distance to drive,” Spock said. “He should be fine.”

“Car it is, then.”

They passed crowds of teens walking from the arcade, little old ladies seeing the remastered version of Waterloo Bridge in the cinema two streets down. One of the stoplights was broken, as it had been for a week, and he rolled through the red light when there were no cars to be seen. They dropped Jim off outside the studio and he kissed them both on the cheek like it was something that normal people did. Jim always did that with his little touches and smiles, and his confidence had nearly tricked Leonard into believing that they didn’t mean anything. He had yet to ponder the exact implications. He had learned that it was very hard to tell what actors were thinking. They could mask emotions just as quickly as they could paint them on.

Spock moved into the front seat and shut the door.

“You work tomorrow?” he asked.

Leonard thought for a moment. “Saturday? Yeah, at seven.”

“It is fortunate that we did not submit to Jim’s longing for alcohol,” Spock noted, looking out at the speeding lights like he always did.

“Please,” he said, “the kid would’ve been asleep in his beer in ten minutes.”

“Is that a medical opinion?” he asked.

Leonard grinned. “You bet.”

They fell into their usual silence, something soft playing in the background. Down their driveway and over the potholes that Leonard would have to fix before the snow came and melted again and made a giant mud pot in place of the gravel. The sun had drifted past the horizon completely, the night darker than he had seen it for months. All of the leaves had turned brittle and brown. He pulled up next to Spock’s little car.

Spock tilted his head. “Would you like to come in, Doctor? There is something I would like to discuss, if you have the time.”

He glanced at the display, blue numbers glowed 10:13.

“Alright, Spock, but I can’t stay long.”

He nodded his approval. Leonard left his keys in the ignition.

“Tea?” Spock asked, handing him the cat as had become their routine.

“Please.”

“Iced or hot?”

“Hot would be great, thanks,” he said. Spock had only just started keeping iced tea in the house, and he insisted on making it rather than buying the ‘antifreeze equivalent’ that he found at the store. Leonard was fairly certain that it was for him.

“I have been considering how to breach this subject for some time,” Spock said, leaning against the counter while his automatic pot hissed, “to little avail. We work too frequently for it to be frequently addressed.”

“I’m not sure what you’re alluding to, Spock, but I can agree with the working bit,” he said. He accepted the mug and the tea pouch that Spock dropped in. He sniffed it cautiously. It was something lighter today, citrusy. They both sat at the counter stools.

“The amount of work that you have chosen to devote to the play is admirable,” Spock said, “especially given your profession.”

He shrugged. “I’m only on call once a week, it’s no big deal.”

“Nevertheless. This is the part, and I believe it may be explained later, that you may consider forward,” Spock began.

Leonard shifted uncomfortably in his chair. He could feel his heartbeat in how hard his palms were pressing against the hot ceramic.

“Are you polyamorous?” Spock asked with no facial tells for Leonard to cling to in the abruptness of the question.

“I…well, yes, I suppose,” he choked out, thinking that maybe he should have chosen the iced tea.

“Then would it be incorrect of me to believe that your devotion to the theatre may be an outlet for your affection to Jim?” he asked, apparently having decided to pull out all stops.

“And to you?” Leonard said quietly.

That little smile appeared on the other man’s face again, and it made Leonard’s heart do something that a man of his age shouldn’t.

“I had hoped,” Spock said.

“I hadn’t really dared to,” he said, “I mean, I knew, I think. That Jim was testing the waters, I was just…I don’t know. I didn’t want to be wrong.”

Spock nodded. “And yet, here we are.”

Leonard tilted his head, taking in Spock's casual confidence, the anticipation in his eyes. “Was it Jim who was testing us, or was it you?”

“I couldn’t say.”

“Sure, you couldn’t.” He held out his cup. “To whatever this is, then?”

They tapped their glasses together, a dull sound but bright nonetheless. 

“To whatever this is,” Spock repeated and kissed him. It was as quickly and chaste as their cups had clicked together, but it warmed him more than the hot tea could.

Leonard left Spock’s house with plans forming in his head.

 

“Okay,” Jim said, surrounded by a gaggle of children. “That’s enough for tonight. You guys did great! I’m really excited for this! I’ll see you all Thursday, alright?”

Leonard leaned up against the stage, smiling. He never thought he’d see his own kid on stage, that’s for sure.

“Hey, Jo,” called. “Nice job today.”

She slid over the floor on her socks and jumped off with a flap of her arms.

“Thanks,” she said, beaming. She’d gotten the part of one of the chorus girls, and she loved it. He was proud of her.

“Your mom’s outside,” he said “Tell her you got all your homework done and that I took you out to dinner, alright?”

“Kay.” She hugged him, pulled on her shoes, and waved as she dashed out the door.

There would be children lingering in the front room for nearly an hour waiting for delayed parents.

“Jim,” he said, “Why don’t you let me clean up tonight? You’ve been working enough.”

Jim picked up one of the candy wrappers. “Bones, these children are a hurricane, but they are my responsibility. Go home.”

He shrugged. “I don’t mind. I drove separately today, thought I could get some shopping done on my way home.”

His eye twitched in suspicion. “Well. Alright.” Jim let his hand slide around the small of Leonard’s back as he wandered in the direction of the door where Spock was sure to be waiting.

Leonard’s hands twitch to reach forward and grab his hand or kiss him, but he would leave that to Spock.

 

He called Spock early the next morning. “How’d it go?” he asked.

“Successful,” Spock said, a smile in his voice.

Leonard narrowed his eyes. “Is Jim there?”

Spock paused.

“He is, isn’t’ he? Oh, Spock, you dog, you.”

“Do not be crude, Leonard.”

“But he is!” he said, delighted.

“Perhaps.”

“You need to give me the details, Spock. Deal?”

Spock yawned. “I’m sure you will acquire all the information you could want. We’ll be taking my car this morning. I have to drop off Jim.”

“Perfect. See you in a half hour.”

Feeling all too bright so early in the morning, Leonard packed a bag full of ingredients and jogged to Spock’s house. It was cold, but not cold enough to warrant a sweater, so he wore jeans and a t-shirt and packed clean scrubs in a bag. Spock was attempting to tame his hair when Leonard arrived. They had both given up on knocking when entering, there seemed to be little point.

“You’re early,” Spock said, eyebrows raised.

“I didn’t think you’d eaten,” he said, grinning and holding up his bag.

“We have not,” he said.

“Perfect.” He found a bowl and began mixing wet ingredients.

There was the soft pad of bare feet on linoleum as Spock approached from behind, and he felt arms circle around his waist.

“Thank you, Leonard,” he said.

“Not a problem,” he smiled, resting his head against Spock’s shoulder. _Hello_ , he thought as Spock turned him around to kiss him. For only having been ‘planning’ together for a two weeks, they fit remarkably well. He ran his hands through Spock’s neat hair just to see his irritated face. Spock took his revenge by pushing him against the stove and smiling against his pulse point.

“Pancakes are waiting,” he said when Spock pulled back, “and so is Jim. How long do you think before he smells food?”

“I would estimate shortly after you begin cooking it,” Spock said, the light hands on either side of his neck still sending shivers down his spine. Leonard shooed him away so the food wouldn’t burn.

He was right. Minutes after he put on the first batch, Jim came stumbling out of the bedroom wearing clothes that were a little too big. He rubbed his eyes.

“B…Is that…” he stared at Leonard, Spock, and then back to Leonard. “Wow,” he said.

“Good morning,” Leonard replied, eyebrow raised. “Wash your hands before coming to the table.”

“No, you can’t show me _this_ sight and then tell me to walk away. That’s not legal.”

He padded up behind just as Spock had, peering at the pancakes. One of his hands rested on Leonard’s back.

“Is this okay?” he asked tentatively.

He smiled. “That’s what I’m here for,” he said. Jim wrapped his arms around his waist and captured his lips, smiling against them. Leonard shook him off to flip a pancake.

“I think it’s a dream come true,” Jim laughed, unwilling to let go. He regained his grasp and kissed him again, lightly this time.

“It shouldn’t be that uncalled for,” Spock said, “as both Leonard and myself have taken you on dates, both separately and together.”

Jim just grinned.

“And I explained our intentions to you in detail last night,” he reasoned.

“That doesn’t make it any less of a nice thing to see when I wake up in the morning.”

“Hey,” Leonard said, “food. Jim, wash. Your. Hands.”

Jim just hugged him again, nuzzling Leonard’s neck and wrapping his hands further around his waist in what was almost too tight of an embrace. Spock smoothed down that odd cowlick on the back of Jim’s head as he had taken to doing before he picked up a bundle of silverware and set it on the table. Leonard wondered what it would be like to have a day with just the three of them, kissing and cuddling and laughing at how bizarre they were.

 

Act 3: Opening Night: January

 

Spock played the most irritating electric piano piece for the forty-fifth time.

“I think you’ve got the muscle memory down,” Leonard said, sitting next to him on the bench.  
Spock stopped playing when he had to reach over the other man to hit a note.

“You just need to relax. You’ve been rehearsing this forever. Hell, even I know that song by heart,” he said. 

“Repetition will solidify my performance,” he said.

“Not if you get too tense to even hit the right keys. I mean, look at Jim.”

Jim was in a corner, pacing. His hair was mussed and it was clear that the makeup artists hadn’t gotten to him yet. He was a wreck. Spock stared.

“Never mind, look at Uhura,” he said, turning his friend’s face to the other side of the room where she was giving a kid a piggyback ride.

“We’ve got four hours until we open. Make the most of it,” he said, kissing Spock on the cheek before moving to repair Jim.

“Hey dad,” Joanna said, spinning in a circle. She looked like a member of Kiss. “How do I look?”

“Like a million bucks,” he said automatically combing hair from her face. “I’m digging the uniform. You’re looking pretty rockin,” he said.

“Sara has to put my makeup back, but we were just trying stuff out,” she said.

He beamed. “See, Spock? That is how relaxed you’re supposed to be before you perform. Jo’s gonna do just great and she’s not worried about it!”

She jumped to attention. “Yup!” she said.

“Alright, kid. You go visit Sara and then see Mr. Scott for your microphone,” he patted her back, “and I’ve got to go stop Jim from thinking too much.”

She glanced at her director, nodded in agreement, and skipped to the top of the amphitheater. Jim had obviously heard their conversation. He waved Leonard away without him having said anything.

“Don’t give me that look, Bones. Don’t do it.”

“What are you doing, Jim?”

“Thinking.”

“Stop it.” He saw the clench of his partner’s jaw, but he didn’t back down.

Jim was in panic mode, and he had learned from experience that there was only one way to snap him out of it.

“Jim,” he said, “Chris Pike is going to be here in an hour. You look like shit. The kids might be ignoring you now, but by the time curtain call comes around, they’re all going to be looking to you to show them how to act. We can’t have you biting your nails off in a corner, alright? You’ve gotta set a good example,” he said. A spark of challenge entered Jim’s eyes and he knew he had gotten through. He hated playing bad cop, especially with Jim, but sometimes it was the most effective.

They’d been practicing what seemed like nonstop for the last three months, and it still didn’t seem like long enough. Auditions, as painful as they were, had provided a good number of incredibly talented young musicians. Jim was elated. He told constant stories of his youth experiences, most of which were incredibly embarrassing and adored by both the kids and parents alike. Even now Leonard knew that he was trying to be the most level-headed director that he could, but it was in Jim’s nature to be a bit of a drama queen.

Janice came up to them and looked about ready to ream them both. Leonard wasn’t in the suit that she had given him to wear and Jim was…well, given the production, it wasn’t too far from the real costume, but it wasn’t what she had picked out, either. He mouthed “one second, please,” at her and she nodded.

“I’m gonna be right here, Jim, okay? If you need anything, just yell at Scotty on the com.”

“Thanks, Bones,” Jim said, looking a little bit grateful. 

“Good,” he said, slapping Jim on the back and stepping over one of the many props that had no explanation. Janice moved in for the kill.

During the production itself he was seated in a little chair backstage with a handful of other parents. Their main task was putting little girls in pigtails and spiking the boys’ hair. Soon enough, Leonard was dabbing stage makeup on one of the little boys, a skill he had never anticipated having. The kid’s dad, M’Benga, had been attending entirety of their practices with a professional camera and a talent for making kids smile. Jim had offered to hire him, but he refused since his own kid was in the play. It still made Leonard a little uncomfortable, hearing the shutter click every ten seconds as he was braiding hair.

He could hear Christopher Pike telling the audience how proud he was to sponsor such a strong group of individuals, etc, etc. It was a little bit surreal. He wished he could see it, but at the same time it was much more interesting being behind the curtain. He could still hear everything, after all.

The first fifteen minutes went great—they were basically just Jim whining at the community actor that played his best friend. The music was background music of the sort that he knew Spock didn’t even have to think about. From his point of view, it sounded fantastic.

Opening night finished without a hitch, the worst thing having been a child with a monotonous voice. He snuck out from backstage at the very end, just in time to watch his daughter be showered with flowers from her mother and her husband. It was a little bit bittersweet, but very good to see. Jim, too, had apparently captured the attention of every young female in the audience, despite his drawn-on five o’clock shadow and a ratty wig.

The second showing went fabulously as well, and the third.

The more performances they did, the more comfortable they became with the script. He could see little moments of improvisation, solos gone wild, increasingly silly hairdos. He couldn’t wait until closing night when things went a little wild.

The fourth wasn’t so spectacular. At the very least, it cleared his confusion about why Jim, an experienced actor and director, would be shaking in anticipation before they went on stage. He wasn’t afraid of messing up his lines or the wrath of the audience, he rather thrived on it.

Act one went swimmingly. Act two did not. Jim burst through the door at intermission, scaring a parent half to death and looking like he was ready to burst. Leonard knew that look. He grabbed Jim by the upper arm and walked him upstairs into the costume room and sat him on top of a clothing chest. Uhura trailed up the stairs after them, worried.

“Jim?” Leonard asked, “You alright?”

“I forgot my goddamn lines, Bones,” he said, tearing off his wig and rubbing at his eye makeup.

“What happened?” Uhura crouched down next to him and took his face in her hands. Apparently she didn’t like what she saw.

“Oh,” she said.

“Yeah, oh.”

“Either o’ you wanna start talking?” he said, both concerned and frustrated. They had a good fifteen minutes before Jim had to be back on stage—he wasn’t worried about that—but the clear implication that everyone knew what was going on but him was irritating.

“Elias,” Uhura said, “was the leader of the troupe we abandoned to come here,” she said.

Leonard wasn’t sure if it was his Jim senses of his relationship senses that were tingling.

“Were the two of you involved?” he asked him, kneeling next to Uhura.

“Elias was less of an old flame and more of a house fire,” she said. “It went badly.

“We fucked once, Uhura, he wasn’t an old flame.”

“I just said that, didn’t I?”

Jim groaned and buried his face in his hands. “He’s gonna want to come backstage, Bones, what am I supposed to do?”

“Jim, if you don’t want to talk to him, you don’t have to.”

“Of course I don’t fucking want to talk to him,” he snapped, “he’s going to _crush us_ under his gigantic ego and ticket sales and affair with Josie-fucking-Adams!”

“Jim…”

“Oh my god, Bones. I fucked it up.”

He mouthed at Uhura to get Spock. She nodded and sprinted out the door with a nervous glance. Leonard just kept petting Jim’s head as he waited anxiously for backup. Finally, he caught a glimpse of the other man at the door. 

“Jim,” Spock said, pulling up a bucket and sitting next to them.

“Spock.”

“Why are you in distress?”

“Messed up my lines.”

Spock hesitated. “Was it halfway through the first act?”

“Yes. God, you noticed? Oh, he’s definitely gonna have noticed.”

“I assumed that it was a strategic line emission,” Spock said, “and that it was effective.”

“And I, the stage manager, didn’t notice it,” Leonard affirmed.

“Guys, what am I gonna do?”

Leonard sat back on his heels. “Okay. First you’re gonna have a sip of this to calm your tits,” he said, procuring a flask of rather low-test whiskey while he mouthed _placebo_ at Spock.

“Thanks,” Jim said, all but guzzling.

“Woah, woah, that’s enough. Now you’re gonna get up, get out there, and finish this play. When it’s done, he’s going to have _nothing_ to criticize you on. I won’t let him back here, but you have to show him that you didn’t just leave his troupe for the heck of it.”

“He’s right,” Uhura said. “It’s gone incredibly well so far. We just have to get through this one and the one tomorrow and you’ll be officially free of him.” She grinned, and it was a little bit intimidating.

“I can’t avoid him?”

“I say absolutely not,” she said.

He clenched his teeth and let them pamper him for a little while longer. Leonard watched him go back out, but he was hesitant. He made it a priority to sit closer to the intercom to hear every line.

At the end of the intermission, Leonard, whose fingers were numb from how many rubber bands he had wrapped around them, was approached by the man he had least expected to see.  
Christopher Pike was a fatherly, respectable man. He had salt and pepper hair and always wore colors that made him seem less intimidating than he was and he seemed to have a peculiar relationship with Jim. They had spoken briefly on opening night and exchanged greetings every day since, but they had never really gotten to know each other. When he saw Pike waiting next to the changing room, it occurred to him that he would have had to exit the building to get to the wheelchair entrance that lead backstage. He wasn’t there by coincidence.

“Can I help you, sir?” he said.

“Actually, Doctor McCoy, yes.”

Ah. He pulled out the “doctor.” That generally meant that (aside from Spock) someone wanted something. At least Pike was willing to admit it.

“What can I do for you?”

Pike tilted his head. “I need you to get Jim to talk to Elias Chavez.”

Leonard’s face hardened. He wasn’t an actor, he couldn’t keep the suspicion off of his face.

“May I ask you something, sir?”

“Go right ahead.”

“Did he hurt Jim?”

“Not in the way that you’re thinking, McCoy. They hurt each other, I think. Jim needs to know that Elias has no intentions of sabotaging his career.” He paused. “Everybody in this business knows each other, and if they start a ‘clan war’, you can bet people will hear about it. There’s no reason for this fight. Elias forgave Jim. Jim needs to forgive Elias.”

Leonard knew better than most how difficult it was to repair something that had been broken.

“Will it matter if I go with?” he asked.

“I would prefer you not to.”

Leonard crossed his arms. “Can you promise me that Elias has no intention of fucking things up?” he asked. He was willing to force Jim to face something he was uncomfortable with if it would benefit his business and his development as an actor, but he was not interested in causing more damage than it would heal.

“Yes,” Pike said with so much conviction that Leonard couldn’t help but believe him, “I can.”

He sighed. “I’ll see what I can do.”

Chris smiled. “That’s all I ask. Thank you.”

“My pleasure,” Leonard said, not totally sure if he had done the right thing.

He left to find Jim before his scene was up. Leonard located him in the lighted makeup room, fixing his hair and tugging on the liquid latex that held his mic in place. As Leonard walked in, he was re-drawing the beard and fidgeting.

“Jim, you’re not gonna like this, but I think you should hear me out,” he said.

He froze, slowly replacing the pencil and slowly turning around like a cornered animal. “Oh boy,” he said. “Gotta love the sound of that.”

Leonard grabbed the powder brush from the table next to him and repaired where the blush had smeared from being corrected one too many times. Jim was looking at him cautiously, like he knew what he was going to say but wasn’t all to ready to hear it. His guess was that Pike had been dropping hints for a while now.

“How are you doing?” he asked, abandoning the brush to sit next to Jim, legs crossed on the counter. The heat of the lights burned his back.

“Fine,” Jim said, not looking at him.

“Chris told me something today while you were performing.”

“I’m sure he did.”

“He told me that things have changed since the two of you last talked. He wants you to see that he’s not here to make things hard for you,” Leonard attempted.

Jim didn’t say anything. It seemed like he’d been working himself up to exactly what he was asking. Leonard admired him for it. He glanced up, at his hands, and returned to the mirror, staring at his reflection in an effort to bury his anxiety.

“I want this to go well for you, Jim,” he said. “I don’t want there to be anything holding you back. I know things didn’t go well with this Elias, but if you can get through this, there will be nothing you need to be afraid of. Chris said he didn’t want me to go with you, but, well, we can change that. I do believe him, though, when he said that Elias doesn’t mean you any harm.”

“I know, Bones. I know.”

“You scared me today,” he admitted, “and I’d like for it to not happen again if we can help it.”

“If I go out there,” Jim said, “I want you within ten feet of me at all times, and not because of what I’m afraid Elias might do.”

He felt a wash of guilt threaten to send his brain into a frenzy, but he shoved it down. “I will be. I’m sorry about this, Jim.”

Jim tore his eyes from the edge of the countertop where his hands were clenched and looked up at Leonard. He leaned forward, very slowly, and kissed him in an apology and a hopeful comfort. It was so soft that it his entire body tingled. His breath left him when Jim’s lips did.

“Let’s do this,” Jim said.

They did it—and Leonard was hesitant to say so, but Elias actually seemed genuine in his desire to see Jim and the group do well. He seemed amiable enough after having been more or less abandoned by half of his theatre troupe. At first they thought it was a farce, but as they talked, it seemed increasingly true. Elias was the sort of man who looked like an actor. He held himself differently, smiled differently, approached people like they had cameras flashing all around. He caught Chris Pike’s eye as he made his way from the stairs and looked away before he could read anything from his expression.

Leonard was proud when Jim made the first move. “Elias,” he said.

“Jim!” He seemed elated, dark eyes widening in pleasant surprise, but his high-watt grin dimmed when he remembered himself. “Jim,” he said again, more subdued.

There was a minute when he was sure Jim was going to turn around and leave, but he did the opposite. He stared at Elias, smiled, and said, “How are you? I’m glad to see you here.”

“I was in town visiting family,” he said, “and I saw you signs. Happy coincidence, really.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah. I really enjoyed myself. I think you did great,” he said honestly.

Leonard could see Jim’s shoulders relaxing.

“Thanks, Elias.” He hesitated, looking to McCoy, who nodded at him encouragingly. “Look, I know there’s some stuff we have to go over,” he said, “But I’d rather not do it now.”

The blinding smile dropped from the other man’s face, just a bit, but he could tell that he was about as hesitant as Jim was. “Yeah, I suppose we do.”

“We’ve got another showing tomorrow at seven, but I’ll be here all day. Would you stop by?” he asked.

“Of course. I’ll come around noon.”

“See you then,” Jim said, and dragged Leonard back up to the curtain-covered stage by his arm.

“Jim,” he started, “You really—”

“I can do this, Bones,” he said, the confidence in his eyes startling him. “You were right. Chris was right. I can do this.”

Leonard planted a kiss on top of his forehead. “Do you want me there?” he asked.

“No,” Jim said. “But I’d like to see you guys afterwards. Lunch?”

He supposed this was what Pike was getting at—building back Jim’s confidence, tearing away his hesitations, and leaving him stronger than he was before. It wasn’t exactly a resolution to their little episode that evening, but it was something they could work with. He caught Uhura’s eye from across the stage and nodded. She smiled at him. She’d be there tomorrow, but he didn’t think he had anything to worry about anyway.

They’d do just fine.

 

The habit of the cast and crew approaching him about anything and everything had not ceased since his conversation with Pike. Uhura would send him pictures asking for advice on dates, Chekov asked him to tutor him in organic chemistry. He and Scotty had gone out drinking several times for various reasons, and Jim seemed to think that he held the secrets of the universe. He’d made quite a group of friends, Chapel and Janice included.

He wasn’t really surprised when the next up to bat was Sulu. They were in the theatre a week after the set of School of Rock had been completely and totally torn apart and recycled. Leonard was taking inventory of repairs and improvements that he thought Jim might have missed when Sulu emerged from backstage.

“I’m sorry for a lack of preamble, Leonard, would you do me a huge favor?” he asked, sitting down on the edge with his legs dangling over.

“That depends,” he said, raising an eyebrow and tucking the clipboard under his arm.

“I’d like you to talk to Chris Pike.”

“What? Why me? Jim knows him better.”

“Yeah,” Sulu said, “but he likes you. And I thought I’d run it by you first, anyway.”

He looked nervous. Sulu never looked nervous, it was unnerving. Leonard recalled Jim’s tendency of calling him the stage dad. It seemed like that didn’t only apply to the children.

“Sit down,” he said, motioning to the chair next to him. Sulu hopped down from the stage and sat.

“I came across a script recently,” he said. “Well, it wasn’t so recently, actually.”

Leonard just sipped from his water bottle and raised an eyebrow.

“I’d like for us to perform it,” he said. “It’s not our usual. It’s not funny, not really, and the lighting directions are going to have to be completely redone, but I’m sure Chekov won’t mind that. It also has a very specific casting criteria.”

“More specific than a bunch of children?”

Sulu smirked. “I guess that’s true enough.”

“What’s it about, Hikaru?”

He sat up straighter. “It’s a historical drama, a musical. About the incarceration of Japanese-Americans in world war two. It’s called Allegiance. It, uh, takes place in the relocation camp called Heart Mountain. I thought… we’re not too far away from one, and we could coordinate it with the WW2 research museum when they do their war hysteria program in June.”

“Why are you hesitant about this?” he asked. “It sounds like you’ve thought it out. We’ve got enough of a Japanese-American community around that casting extras shouldn’t be a problem.”

“I want to direct it,” he said, blushing.

Leonard raised an eyebrow. “Ah. Is this about Jim? He knows you’re good. He’s not going to shoot you down because he wants the position for himself,” he said.

“No,” Hikaru said, “That’s not it at all. It’s just…” he shrugged. “The only part available for him would be an antagonist. A racist. And he hates that more than anything.”

Leonard smiled. “Hikaru, there’s more to theatre than acting and Jim knows it. He can be backstage and still pull just as many strings as if he was singing and dancing out there. I’ll run it by him and see what he says, how about it? Do you have a script?”

He shook his head. “I’d have to get permission from the writer, but I can do that easy enough. He’s…well, he wouldn’t turn down the grandson of an incarceree, anyway.”

“Not one with your resume,” Leonard smiled.

Sulu smiled gratefully. “There’s a video online of the Broadway performance from a couple years ago,” he said. “I can show it to you, if you want.”

He stood up and offered a hand. Sulu pulled himself up with a smile. “Send it to me,” Leonard said, “and I’ll show it to Jim.”

 

“This looks good,” Jim said, lying in bed with his feet kicked up on several extra pillows. He was peering down at a tablet, one headphone in and the other dangling on the pillow, waiting for Spock to return. “It looks really good. I think he’s onto something.”

Leonard nodded from his place at the desk. “I told him you’d say that,” he said. “I can tell he’s passionate about it.”

Jim yawned. “It’s something to be passionate about. I think we should do it.”

“He’ll be glad to hear that.”

He signed another paper and tossed it into a pile. It was his fault for putting off his paperwork during production week, but damn was he starting to regret it.

“Bones, come onnn. You’ve got to be done with that by now.”

He rubbed his eyes. “Go bother Spock. I’m not done.”

“Spock’s getting me food, I’m not bothering him.”

“I am relieved to hear it,” Spock said, sitting next to Jim on the bed. They squished together with a spot open for Leonard whenever he could manage to tear himself away. Spock bit into a caramel and Jim stole two.

“Bonessssss.”

“Jim.”

“Bones, come on.”

He ignored him.

“Bones!”

“Leonard, he will keep calling and it will be very difficult to continue your work.”

He glanced at Spock and Jim who were cuddled on the strange amalgamation of mattresses they had stuffed together. Spock had his arm around Jim’s shoulders and he patted the space next to him. Jim waved a piece of homemade candy at him, eyes pouting. He felt his resolve leak away.

“Fine,” he said, slipping into warmer pajamas and sliding in next to Spock. Jim tried to pat his hair but only managed to lay his hand over Leonard’s face.

“Hold on, Spock, just let me…” Jim crawled over him to kiss them both and wedge himself between them. “If we do this thing with Sulu, you’re gonna be there, aren’t you? Both of you?”

“What do you mean?” Leonard asked, slinging his arm underneath Jim’s neck to play with Spock’s hair.

“I mean in the production. With me.”

“I had no intentions of leaving,” Spock said.

“We’re staying, Jim.”

“Good,” he said sleepily.


End file.
